


After the Fall

by tryslora



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, Gamefic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-03-06
Updated: 2008-03-06
Packaged: 2017-10-19 15:13:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/202242
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryslora/pseuds/tryslora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Lucretia Weasley creates a video memory of how her parents (Ron and Pansy) got together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After the Fall

**Author's Note:**

> The characters and world of Harry Potter are owned by JK Rowling; no infringement is intended and I'm making no money off of this.
> 
> This was written as a background piece for a massively AU RPG: After the Fall.

Once upon a time...

 _This isn't a Muggle fairy tale, darling._

I know, Mom, and don't call them Muggles. For all intents and purposes, pureblood background aside, we're Muggles now, right? Besides, all the best stories begin that way.

 **I'm sure she knows best, Pans. In case you haven't noticed, she's got the Weasley brains.**

Thank you, Dad. Anyway, once upon a time...

 _Parkinson brains._

Shut up, both of you, or I'll never get this story told. And see that thing over there? That camera is recording every thing we say, including all of your interjections. So let me talk already, so we can get this properly recorded for posterity.

 **We ought to see if we can recreate the Quick Quote Quill. Stock it in the...**

DAD. Okay. Once upon a time there were places in the world where Wizarding folk lived, all together in their communities, and magic was a common and safe thing. Then came the Culling, when the ordinary world discovered that Wizarding folk lived among them, and in the way of those who are afraid, they sought to destroy that which terrified them.

This story begins with our hero, a simple Wizard who's eldest brother, fearing for his wife's life, had decided they had to disappear. And so, the eldest brother entrusted his only daughter to our hero, his youngest brother, whom we shall call Ron.

 **Good thing, that, since it's my name. And I wasn't a simple Wizard...**

Which has no bearing on _this_ story, Dad. This is about the Culling, not the War. You can babble on about Hermione and Harry some other time.

So Bill -- that would be the brother -- left his infant daughter Emilia in Ron's care. Poor Ron honestly had no idea quite what to do with a child, especially one so small as Emilia was. But he had a passport, and plans for a new identity when he reached the States, and tickets on a flight out of Heathrow. So with the baby in a sling, and a small bag of luggage, he made his way into a world he didn't understand at all -- the airport.

He was stopped first at the security checkpoint, asked to carry Emilia through and to surrender his luggage to a machine which ate it up and belched it out again after looking deep inside it. He hovered at first, wanting to see what the machine was doing, thinking that his father would have rather liked to see such a thing, had his father survived the Culling's first descent upon the Ministry. But they made him move through and further into the airport where the sights and sounds of the Muggle world were quickly overwhelming to a Wizard who had been raised pureblood. Even his friendships with his Muggleborn and Muggle raised best friends weren't enough to prepare him.

 **I wasn't that much of a git...**

 _Let Lucretia tell the story, dearest._

He made his way amongst impatient people who jostled him and had no patience with his staring (or questions), finally finding the gate. At which point Emilia awoke, tired and hungry and thus, doing what eight month old children do best -- bawling.

At this moment, we need to digress. For in this same airport, in fact standing at this same gate, was a witch. Her upbringing had been completely different from Ron's -- privileged and moneyed, where he had neither. Slytherin to his Gryffindor, social climbing to sweet and homey. And yet, she was as much a pureblood as he was, and this _place_ , so strange and unfamiliar, made her uncomfortable. And when she was uncomfortable, Pansy retreated into a shell of calm and cold, and quite bitterly snappish.

 _Lucretia!_

 **She has you pegged there, Pans. You were a complete b--**

Dad! Don't start, you two. So there we had our witch and wizard, and one screaming child. Pansy only heard the child, and snapped without even looking, "Can't you keep that brat quiet?"

Hands (and ears) full of Emilia, and no way to magically warm the bottle he had for her, Ron was lacking in patience himself. "She's hungry," he snapped back. "And needs a nappie changed. And..." his voice trailed off as he looked back. "Oh bloody hell. You."

It wasn't the first time they'd met, you see. They were in the same year at Hogwarts, and had known each other since childhood. And they had always, without fail, loathed each other.

Pansy rolled her eyes. "Well, isn’t this precious. A W---"

"Shh!" he cut her off short, hissing, "We're incognito. And I like my head where it is, thanks. Not so fond of being burnt at the stake, either."

"I can't think how you could possibly be in disguise with that _hair,_ " she snapped back, her voice a hissed whisper. "If there's a single person even slightly knowledgeable looking for," a sharp wave of her hand towards him, "here, you stand out as if you were already aflame. I'll not be burnt with you."

Emilia, not knowing what was going on save that she was still wet, and still quite hungry, screamed even more loudly, to the point where others were starting to watch as Pansy and Ron argued.

"Give her to me." Her tone was sharp, but her hands were kind as Pansy snatched the child from Ron's arms. "Go up to one of the stands and ask for a bit of tea. You can use the cup to warm the bottle in." At his look she drew back, expression pinched. "You can't use your..." she nodded at his hand, refusing to say the word here in public, "without them noticing. Haven't you heard about the detection devices that have been put in place? Go on now, get the water before she screams the place down."

By the time Ron returned, the baby bottle floating in a papercup of hot water, Pansy had Emilia cradled in her arms and was tickling the wee bit of a thing under her chin. Ron paused, blinking a moment at the oddly domestic scene of his brother's most definitely Weasley child settled in Parkinson arms as she cooed at the baby. Rather than sitting in the place he'd had, he gathered up his things and moved them around to the other bank of seats and settled in next to Pansy. "Thanks," he said gruffly, for never let it be said that his mother hadn't instilled manners in him. "I'll take her back now."

"You'll do no such thing, Ronald," Pansy murmured. "She's quiet now, and if you think I'm going to subject myself to a trip shut up in a flying tin with a screaming brat to shatter my eardrums, you've another thought coming. My ticket's there -- go see if you can have us seated together, since she seems to like me far better than you." She gave him an arch look. "Her," she cut off abruptly, but Ron knew she meant to say Veela, "blood shows taste."

When he didn't move, she snapped softly, " _Now_ , Ronald."

 **Lucy, you're bloody eerie when you imitate your mum like that.**

I learn from the best, Dad. Anyway, we'll scroll forward a bit as the three had to wait, and wait, and in the fashion of Muggle airports, wait a bit more before they were called to board. With the babe in arms, the two were treated as a couple and allowed to board early and get settled, which did little to remove the frustration and claustrophobia of the others coming in to sit around them.

By the time the aeroplane took off, the two had realized that in this world of Muggles, they were the only two who spoke the same language. And the only two with no idea what to expect. And that they might just have to rely on each other.

 _Not that your father would admit it._

 **Me, Pans? For Merlin's sake, you kept insisting for the next month that you needed nothing from me, and walking out, then you'd show up on my doorstep again. People thought we were in one constant lovers' spat.**

 _We weren't lovers yet._

 **Beside the point. We were pretending to be to stay alive.**

Until five years passed. And Emilia started Muggle school, and Ron and Pansy had finally settled in a routine. She was asked to be a room mother for Emilia's kindergarten class, and with no idea how to do such a thing, Pansy agreed. After all, from what she understood, it was what Muggleborn mothers, who raised their own children, _did_. And Ronald had a respectable Muggle job in an office, dealing with numbers (which he loathed).

And for five years, the only wizarding folk they had seen were each other.

And so on All Hallow's Eve, as they walked about the neighborhood, with the folk around them commenting on just how utterly lovely and strangely attractive their wee bit of a daughter was (her Veela blood already showing in her porcelain beauty), Ronald looked at Pansy and realized that this was his life now. With this woman, and the little girl who called them Mum and Dad even though they were neither. And as Emilia skipped up to ring a doorbell, Ron caught Pansy's hand and held her back.

She stopped in surprise, as for all they played the part, they had never been involved, nor touched casually. She opened her mouth to retort, but had no time before Ron kissed her.

 **Thought you were going to hex my bits off.**

 _Likely would've if I'd still dared carry a wand, dearest. Never surprise a Slytherin._

 **My gut well remembers the sucker punch.**

Once Ron recovered from the punch Pansy gave in her surprise, he kissed her again, and proposed then and there. And from that point on, they were truly a family.

 **What about the rest of it? The shop? George and Lee? Dean?**

Story for another time, Dad. This one's just for us.


End file.
